Trust Centre Research Articles

Katherine Angel, Edgar Jones and Michael Neve (eds), European psychiatry on the eve of war: Aubrey Lewis, the Maudsley Hospital and the Rockefeller Foundation in the 1930s, Medical History, Supplement No 22, London, Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College London, 2003, pp. 195, illus, £32.00, US$50.00 (hardback 0-85484-092-3).

Katherine Angel, Edgar Jones and Michael Neve (eds), European psychiatry on the eve of war: Aubrey Lewis, the Maudsley Hospital and the Rockefeller Foundation in the 1930s, Medical History, Supplement No 22, London, Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College London, 2003, pp. 195, illus, £32.00, US$50.00 (hardback 0-85484-092-3). - Volume 49 Issue 2

Ian F. McNeely. “Medicine on a Grand Scale”: Rudolf Virchow, Liberalism, and the Public Health. (The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College London Occasional Publication, No. 1.) 97 pp., bibl, index. London: Trustee of the Wellcome Trust, 2002. £10 (paper).

Ian F. McNeely. “Medicine on a Grand Scale”: Rudolf Virchow, Liberalism, and the Public Health. (The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College London Occasional Publication, No. 1.) 97 pp., bibl, index. London: Trustee of the Wellcome Trust, 2002. £10 (paper).

Christopher C Booth, A physician reflects: Herman Boerhaave and other essays, Occasional Publication No. 2, London, Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL, 2003, pp. xiii, 206, £15.00 (paperback 0-85484-093-1).

Christopher C Booth, A physician reflects: Herman Boerhaave and other essays, Occasional Publication No. 2, London, Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL, 2003, pp. xiii, 206, £15.00 (paperback 0-85484-093-1). - Volume 49 Issue 1

Use of an enzyme-linked immunosorbent asay to diagnose avian tuberculosis in a captive collection of wildfowl

The current study assessed the diagnostic accuracy of an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and evaluated it as a diagnostic screening aid for avian tuberculosis (TB) in a wildfowl collection at the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust Centre at Llanelli, Wales, U.K.. Four hundred and eighteen birds of the collection, including geese, ducks, and swans, were screened for mycobacterial antibody levels. Of those birds tested, 40 died during the period of this study and gross post mortem examinations were performed. The ELISA showed a sensitivity of 76.9% and a specificity of 55.6% using post-mortem findings as the ‘gold standard’. Thirteen of the examined birds showed evidence of avian TB at necropsy. In addition, liver and spleen biopsies of 19 birds were examined histopathologically. There was minimal agreement between gross post mortem and histopathological findings. PCR performed on 13 of the specimens prepared for histopathology did not identify the presence of mycobacterial DNA. The findings reveal a need for further research to improve the sensitivity and specificity of this ELISA and the accurate diagnosis of avian TB.

FLESH IN THE AGE OF REASON * Roy Porter * 2003. Allen Lane * Price 25.00. ISBN 0713-99149-6

‘What became of soul, I wonder?’? (Title is taken from Robert Browning's poem ‘A Toccata of Galuppi’s’) By the late 18th century, the clergyman at the bedside of the dying was largely replaced by the doctor; death was considered less of a portal to life eternal, as it had previously been, than as a ‘framing device to life’. This is the thesis put forward by the late Roy Porter, formerly Professor in the Social History of Medicine at the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College, London, and editor of the Cambridge Illustrated History of Medicine. Porter is the historian of the mind, especially the treatment of the insane, and of body–mind relations or, as we call it, the self. He earned a worldwide reputation for his massive erudition, light touch and learned wit. This brilliant book charts the change from a view of humankind as ‘a little lower than the angels’ in a vast hierarchical ‘chain of being’ down to pond life, to being seen as the passive recipient of impressions which determined a person's character, and made him a victim of chance. Porter shows how the zeitgeist interacted with medical practice. Discarded metaphysics, considered obvious or ‘common sense’ until the next extraneous theory came along, for a long while underlay treatment. Shakespeare is full of allusions to obsolete medical and psychological doctrines. Lady Macbeth describes memory as ‘warder of the brain’, which can be disabled by drink to become a ‘fume’. When Shakespeare writes ‘Tie up the libertine in a field of feasts, Keep his brain fuming’ he alludes to the theory of digestion current in his day; that food and wine sent up ‘fumes’ to the head, causing intoxication. These expressions present no obvious difficulty, but rest on a substratum of obsolete medical …

The Confinement of the Insane: International Perspectives, 1800–1965

Back to table of contents Previous article Next article Book Forum: HistoryFull AccessThe Confinement of the Insane: International Perspectives, 1800–1965EDWARD SHORTER, Ph.D., EDWARD SHORTERSearch for more papers by this author, Ph.D., Toronto, Ont., CanadaPublished Online:1 Sep 2004https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ajp.161.9.1732AboutSectionsPDF/EPUB ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack Citations ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InEmail This useful little volume will quickly bring clinicians interested in the history of psychiatry up to speed on what is happening in the discipline. David Wright, a social historian of medicine at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, and the late Roy Porter, who was a professor of the social history of medicine at the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College, London, asked leading scholars in the history of the mental hospital to update us on their research. In doing so, these scholars generally make clear what has been happening in the history of psychiatry. Porter’s introductory historiographical essay places the asylum in the context of recent writing, and the 14 following monographs give us a worldwide tour, ranging from Japan to Argentina, from South Carolina to Vaud, Switzerland.A number of the contributions really do not get much beyond rather conventional institutional history, chronicling who was admitted, what diagnoses they received, and (usually) how beastly the asylum doctors were to the patients, operating, as physicians did, on the basis of the ideas available to them, which in retrospect the wise historian recognizes as sadly inadequate. Ironical quotation marks accompany much of the material of the day, and suspiciousness of the discipline of psychiatry is well represented on many of these pages. Women and their supposed psychiatric plight are never far from anyone’s mind.Some bright spots are worth mentioning. Jacques Gasser and Geneviève Heller report on their massive ongoing analysis of more than 50,000 charts in the Swiss Romande. Patricia Prestwich looks at family relations of patients in a Paris asylum from 1876 to 1914. David Wright and collaborators offer a quantitative analysis of such matters as length of admission in several Ontario mental hospitals. I found the analysis by Andrea Dörries and Thomas Beddies of the Wittenauer mental hospital in Berlin in the years 1919–1960 of particular interest because the authors look at mode of treatment by diagnosis so that one can see for which indications the clinicians used, for example, ECT or occupational therapy.In terms of what is happening in asylum history today, this volume represents the cream of the cream. By way of criticism, one might offer that innovative new techniques in psychiatric history, such as the retrospective diagnosis of patients’ charts, are quite absent here. It is surprising that historians of psychiatry have made little use of retrospectively diagnosing the often rich charts in the way that has served clinical psychiatry so well. One thinks of the retrospective analysis of charts at the University of Iowa, for example. The authors collectively are quite incurious about the causes of the huge 19th-century explosion in the number of patients hospitalized, except to urge upon us the notion that there was something quite repressive about the whole idea. Finally, the history of therapeutics comes off quite short: It would be very interesting to know more about the early days of ECT, for example, now that the treatment is making a comeback, or extrapyramidal symptoms in the phenothiazines: Were there really so many as subsequent makers of rival compounds have claimed? The quantitative analysis of charts in the mental hospital could be quite productive. It is a shame that professional historians of psychiatry remain so attached to questions of the days of bell-bottom pants and the Beatles.Reprints are not available; however, Book Forum reviews can be downloaded at http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org.Edited by Roy Porter and David Wright. Cambridge, U.K., Cambridge University Press, 2003, 371 pp., $70.00. FiguresReferencesCited byDetailsCited byNone Volume 161Issue 9 September 2004Pages 1732-1732 Metrics PDF download History Published online 1 September 2004 Published in print 1 September 2004

Historical Perspectives

Fifty years ago, Professor Paul Polani and colleagues described young women who had Turner syndrome and were found to have apparently male “chromosomal sex.” (1) At that time, the generally accepted number of chromosomes in humans was 48. Five years earlier, Barr and Bertram described the presence of a prominent mass of chromatin lying close to the nucleolar membrane in neurons of some female cats. (2) This “sex-chromatin” was not found in the males. These “Barr bodies” later were detected in cells grown from skin biopsies. (3) Then, in 1956, Tjio and Levan reported that the number of diploid chromosomes was 46, (4) which rapidly was confirmed by others. (5) From this ripple, a wave soon developed. Three years later, the first association of a clinical syndrome with an abnormal number of chromosomes was reported from France (6) and quickly confirmed in Scotland. (7) This was the association of Down syndrome (mongolism) with an extra chromosome number 21 (trisomy 21), although this was called chromosome number 22 at the time. Not long afterward, translocation was noted in a girl who had Down syndrome born to a 21-year-old mother, (8) and translocation was described as a cause of familial mongolism. (9) Other trisomies soon were described. (10)(11) Based on the realization that the number of sex-chromatin bodies was one less than the number of X chromosomes present, the chromosomes of women who had Turner syndrome and appeared to be chromosomally “male” were investigated. They were found to have 45 chromosomes, with the sex chromosomes being XO. (12) Many of these exciting chromosomal discoveries were made by Professor Polani and his colleagues. Elsewhere, Professor Polani (now 90 years old) has described in detail the origins and evolution of clinical cytogenetics. (13) In this issue of NeoReviews , …

Book Notes

Considering the importance of Rudolf Virchow (1821-1902) to the history of nineteenth-century medical science and social medicine, it is surprising that there has not been a Virchow "industry." Erwin Ackerknecht's standard biography, though still informative reading, is now half a century old. For those who teach the history of medicine and for anyone with an interest in Virchow's rich career, we are indebted to Professor McNeely of the University of Oregon, in collaboration with the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College, London, for providing this hundred-page booklet that sees Virchow through a new lens.

Reproductive strategies used by moorhens (Gallinula chloropus) colonizing an artificial wetland habitat in south Wales

Over the last ten years, a high-density breeding population (c.180 individuals) of moorhens Gallinula chloropus (Linnaeus) has become established in an artificially created wetland habitat at the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (WWT) centre in Llanelli. The reproductive behaviour and success of this population was the subject of an intensive study between 1997–1999. Whilst monogamy was the dominant breeding system used at the site, some individuals bred annually in communal and co-operative groups. The majority of individuals within communal and co-operative groups in 1998 and 1999 were first order relatives. The number of communal groups recorded progressively declined whereas the number of co-operative groups increased over the period of study. Territory size of breeding groups was unrelated to either breeder type or group number. Most nests were constructed in Juncus although many birds also nested in trees and nest boxes intended for captive bred wildfowl. Vegetation height above nests strongly influenced breeding success, and nest site choice at the site was partially determined by vegetation management practices. Such practices may have been responsible for decreased nesting success in specific areas. Rats were the principal egg predators on site accounting for approximately 80% of eggs predated. The study reveals how the reproductive dynamics of this opportunistic bird influences its successful colonization of a new habitat.

Molecular Environment of Integrins: (including presentation of the Jubilee Lecture) Chancellors Conference Centre, University of Manchester, 1–3 December 2003

This Biochemical Society Focused Meeting was held jointly with the Wellcome Trust Centre for Cell-Matrix Research, University of Manchester, to mark the award of the Jubilee Lectureship to Dr Erkki Ruoslahti (Burnham Institute, La Jolla,CA, USA) in recognition of his pioneering discoveries in the extracellular matrix and cell-adhesion fields.

Wellcome witnesses: The Medical Research Council Applied Psychology Unit.

A Witness Seminar brings together individuals involved in a significant event in the treatment of a medical condition to describe its background and to discuss, debate, or even to disagree with their peers' recollections. A brief description is given of the Witness Seminar, held in June 2001 by the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College London, which considered the history of Medical Research Council's Applied Psychology Unit (ABU) in Cambridge, United Kingdom. The APU was created in 1944 and produced more than 3,000 papers before it was renamed the Cognition and Brain Sciences Unite (CBU) in 1998. Photographs of key figures and purpose-built apparatus illustrate some of its early work as recorded in the published transcript of the meeting.

Change and continuity

When you open The EMBO Journal—online or in print—you can usually get down to the business of reading about the latest scientific developments without delay. But this issue requires an editorial commentary. Having quietly celebrated its 21st anniversary last year (the old ‘coming of age' birthday), some changes have taken place at The EMBO Journal as it enters 2004. One of these is that we have now completed our change of publisher to Nature Publishing Group (NPG), a move that was initiated last year with EMBO Reports. Coinciding with this, The EMBO Journal will have a more extensive web presence, papers will be published online ahead of print, and there are subtle changes to the layout and cover. You will also notice that papers are now categorized according to subject, which will allow those who do not wish to browse through the entire journal to quickly identify papers relevant to their interest. Each paper is assigned one or two of the 18 categories, indicating their relevance to different communities. In an ongoing process, articles published in back issues of the journal from 1997 onwards are also being categorized, and a fully categorized archive will be available from mid-2004. Given that articles in The EMBO Journal have a particularly long half-life compared with most other journals (as judged by citations outside the period used for the Citation Index), this is an important addition.

Review: Medical Geography in Historical Perspective

Medical Geography in Historical Perspective Nicolaas A. Rupke London The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL 2000 xii, 227 $ 50

Leon Michaels, The eighteenth-century origins of angina pectoris: predisposing causes, recognition and aftermath, Medical History, Supplement No. 21, London, Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL, 2001, pp. xvii, 219, illus., £32.00, US$50.00 (hardback 0-85484-073-7). Orders to: Professional & Scientific Publications, BMA House, Tavistock Square, London WC1H 9JR, UK.

Leon Michaels, The eighteenth-century origins of angina pectoris: predisposing causes, recognition and aftermath, Medical History, Supplement No. 21, London, Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL, 2001, pp. xvii, 219, illus., £32.00, US$50.00 (hardback 0-85484-073-7). Orders to: Professional & Scientific Publications, BMA House, Tavistock Square, London WC1H 9JR, UK.

Medical Geography in Historical Perspective. Edited by Nicholas A. Rupke (London, Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College London, 2000) 227 pp.$50.00

October 01 2002 Medical Geography in Historical Perspective Medical Geography in Historical Perspective. Edited by Nicholas A.Rupke (London, Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at University College London, 2000) 227 pp.$50.00 Kenneth F. Kiple Kenneth F. Kiple Bowling Green State University Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Scholar Author and Article Information Kenneth F. Kiple Bowling Green State University Online Issn: 1530-9169 Print Issn: 0022-1953 © 2002 Massachusetts Institute of Technology and The Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Inc.2002 The Journal of Interdisciplinary History (2002) 33 (2): 280–281. https://doi.org/10.1162/00221950260208760 Cite Icon Cite Permissions Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Search Site Citation Kenneth F. Kiple; Medical Geography in Historical Perspective. The Journal of Interdisciplinary History 2002; 33 (2): 280–281. doi: https://doi.org/10.1162/00221950260208760 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentAll JournalsThe Journal of Interdisciplinary History Search Advanced Search This content is only available as a PDF. © 2002 Massachusetts Institute of Technology and The Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Inc.2002 Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

Nicolaas A Rupke (ed.), Medical geography in historical perspective, Medical History, Supplement No. 20, London, The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL, 2000, pp. xii, 227, illus., £32.00, US$50.00 (hardback 0-85484-072-9).

Nicolaas A Rupke (ed.), Medical geography in historical perspective, Medical History, Supplement No. 20, London, The Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL, 2000, pp. xii, 227, illus., £32.00, US$50.00 (hardback 0-85484-072-9).

The Role of a Surface Cavity of Alpha-1-Antitrypsin in Polymer Formation: Implications for Rational Drug Design

Conference Abstract| March 01 2002 The Role of a Surface Cavity of Alpha-1-Antitrypsin in Polymer Formation: Implications for Rational Drug Design H Parfrey; H Parfrey 1Respiratory Medicine Unit, Department of Medicine, The Wellcome Trust Centre for Molecular Mechanisms in Disease, Cambridge Institute for Medical Research, Hills Road, Cambridge. CB2 2XY Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar A Zhou; A Zhou 1Respiratory Medicine Unit, Department of Medicine, The Wellcome Trust Centre for Molecular Mechanisms in Disease, Cambridge Institute for Medical Research, Hills Road, Cambridge. CB2 2XY Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar TR Dafforn; TR Dafforn 1Respiratory Medicine Unit, Department of Medicine, The Wellcome Trust Centre for Molecular Mechanisms in Disease, Cambridge Institute for Medical Research, Hills Road, Cambridge. CB2 2XY Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar DA Lomas DA Lomas 1Respiratory Medicine Unit, Department of Medicine, The Wellcome Trust Centre for Molecular Mechanisms in Disease, Cambridge Institute for Medical Research, Hills Road, Cambridge. CB2 2XY Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Clin Sci (Lond) (2002) 102 (s46): 2P. https://doi.org/10.1042/cs102002P Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Twitter LinkedIn Cite Icon Cite Get Permissions Citation H Parfrey, A Zhou, TR Dafforn, DA Lomas; The Role of a Surface Cavity of Alpha-1-Antitrypsin in Polymer Formation: Implications for Rational Drug Design. Clin Sci (Lond) 1 March 2002; 102 (s46): 2P. doi: https://doi.org/10.1042/cs102002P Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentAll JournalsClinical Science Search Advanced Search This content is only available as a PDF. © 2002 The Biochemical Society and the Medical Research Society2002 Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

Malaria invades Yorkshire.

The mosquitoes themselves were conspicuously absent from the presentations this year. By contrast, genomics research was prominently represented. One highlight for me was Emily Lyons’ (Wellcome Trust Centre, Oxford, UK) discussion on recent data pointing to a surprisingly recent origin of P. falciparum (perhaps, only 3500 years ago) 8xRecent origin of Plasmodium falciparum from a single progenitor. Volkman, S.K. et al. Science. 2001; 293: 482–484Crossref | PubMed | Scopus (127)See all References8.In summary, this meeting firmly repositioned the BSP meeting as the European malaria meeting of the year (half of the presentations were by non-British scientists). A firm, but gentle, pressure was put on the plentiful Danish contingent to arrange the 2002 meeting in Denmark as a joint exercise. Whoever agrees to arrange the next gathering will have a hard act to follow after the successful meeting this year.

Book Reviews

Journal Article Book Reviews Get access Jonathan Sadowsky, Imperial Bedlam: Institutions of Madness in Colonial Southwest Nigeria, Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 1999. Pp. xi + 169. $16.95. ISBN 0-520-21617-2. ANNA GREENWOOD ANNA GREENWOOD Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic PubMed Google Scholar Social History of Medicine, Volume 14, Issue 3, December 2001, Pages 584–585, https://doi.org/10.1093/shm/14.3.584 Published: 01 December 2001

The search for susceptibility genes

Anthony P Monaco (photo) is Professor of Human Genetics and Director of the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics. Anthony J Bailey is a clinical scientist with the Medical Research Council at the Centre for Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry.